Healing Gaza…

John 5:1-9

1 After this there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. ³ In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. ⁵ One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. ⁶ When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, ‘Do you want to be made well?’ ⁷ The sick man answered him, ‘Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.’ ⁸ Jesus said to him, ‘Stand up, take your mat and walk.’ ⁹ At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk. Now that day was a sabbath.

Every now and then, very rarely, a gospel reading appears in the service that doesn’t match the one the priest diligently worked on through the week. A moment of panic ensues and then there’s a choice to make…rewrite, or confuse the people by reading and preaching on something not in their pew sheet. This week, I opted for the latter, and so it is that we find ourselves, almost unexpectedly, beside the portico of Solomon, waiting for those waters to stir…

This week, ABC news reported that minimal aid would be allowed to enter the Palestinian territory for the first time in over 11 weeks. Those trucks were held up at the border for another 3 days, while a further 29 babies and children died of malnutrition. Eventually, on Friday, 90 trucks crossed the border, stocked with flour, baby food and medical supplies. People were trampled and killed in the desperate scramble for things that might bring life, healing, nourishment, hope.  There was precious little for the 2.1million people caught up in this genocide. Ninety trucks in 12 weeks is a far cry from the five hundred trucks that used to enter Gaza daily, before the war. 140,000 tonnes of food, on 6,000 lorries waits in aid corridors; enough to feed the entire population for two months, but the access is blocked. The world watches while a mama feeds her baby saltwater, to trick its newborn belly into thinking it has been fed. Saltwater, like tears.

It’s hard not to think of those people while we hear the story of the man lying beside that pool for 38 years, hanging onto the belief that if he could just be the first person to make it into the pool when the water is stirred up, he might be healed.

If only he could get to the water, but he has nobody to help him.

If only they could get to the truck.

If only the truck could get to the people, but they have nobody to help them.

A clumsy comparison, for sure, but one that has plagued me all week.

And then Jesus walks by and does three things.

First, he sees him – when Jesus saw him lying there. He saw him among the many invalids – blind, lame and paralysed – and he knew he had been there for a long time. He sees him in a world that looks away when faced with disease and disability.

Then he speaks to him – he said to him, ‘do you want to be made well?’ Not in judgment or chastisement, but in invitation, offering an outstretched hand. Do you want to be made well – a beautiful, compassionate phrase in a world where those lying on the roadside are looked over or ignored.

He sees him. He speaks to him. And then he heals him.

He frees him from that which has kept him captive for the last 38 years or more – stand up, take up your mat and walk.

And then… Jesus disappears from the story. We never hear what the man does next. We don’t know if he dances or runs or weeps. We don’t know if he tells the others or fades into the crowd. But we know this: something changed. Someone saw him. Someone spoke. Someone moved toward his pain — and through that encounter, something new began. His health was restored, but much more importantly, his humanity was restored. He was given the chance to be whole again.

How much I would love that for the people of Gaza – health, humanity, healing, wholeness. How much I would love that for all humankind. How much God longs for that.

And friends, on Thursday — we remember the Ascension. That strange and holy moment when Jesus left his disciples, blessing them even as he was raised from their sight. And I wonder if they were tempted to do what we’re tempted to do:
Stand staring upward, hoping for another miracle. Waiting for the next flash of divine light. Waiting for something, and then the dawning realisation as the angels say, “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” that what is really being said is it’s your turn now.

When Jesus ascends, he doesn’t abandon the world. He entrusted it to his disciples. And that means he entrusts it to us.  We are the body of Christ now. We are the ones called to see the ones no one sees.
To speak with compassion where silence reigns.

To stretch out our hands — not in power, but in mercy.

To ask the world, “Do you want to be made well?”

And to be ready to listen to the answer and do something about it.

We are the ones who carry the healing presence of Christ.

Not to fix everything. Not to end all suffering. But to witness it. To weep with it.

To make real, here and now, the love that will never walk past a suffering soul.

That is what it means to be Ascension people: Not to wait for heaven to act, but to embody the Christ who is already here. Through us. Not perfect. But present.  So, this week, if, when, you see someone lying beside the metaphorical pool — someone exhausted from waiting for justice, aching for recognition, yearning for life — don’t look up to heaven. Look toward them. Live like Jesus is here — because through you, he is.

Before we close, let’s return to those Gazan streets.

People of God, we have been seen and loved and made whole by Christ, so we cannot walk away from those we remembered at the start — the mothers holding out their arms, the children waiting for food, the elderly caught between walls and checkpoints — they are not just news stories. They are Christ, they are that paralytic, lying beside the pool. And we are his body now.

We feel powerless, but we can act. We can send aid. We can pray. We can pressure. We can speak. We can stay awake to suffering, even when the headlines move on.

We can carry hope, not as something soft and sentimental — but as something stubborn and active.

So today, may we not stand, looking up, waiting for God to do something.

May we Be Christ. The world is waiting for us. We are the hands and feet and eyes, ears and voice of the crucified, risen and ascended Christ. At his Ascension he passes on the baton and says ‘your move’. May we move swiftly and with mercy. Amen.